Small Businesses Fight IRS Over Data

By

Laura Saunders

Updated May 26, 2011 12:01 am ET

The Internal Revenue Service, moving aggressively to collect more taxes from small businesses, is telling companies being audited to turn over exact copies of the electronic records kept in their business-software programs, according to a letter from an agency official to the American Institute of CPAs.

The accounting group fears this will force small businesses to turn over customer lists, personnel data, confidential client information and other unrelated information often contained in the off-the-shelf software programs...